![\"Countdown](\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/countdown2adv.jpg\")
I’m writing this particular blog to discuss, the DC comic “Countdown to Adventure”.\u00a0 However, I feel it necessary to give you my perspective on the main title “Countdown to Final Crisis”\u00a0first.\u00a0 So please bear with me…<\/p>\nI’m writing this particular blog to discuss, the DC comic “Countdown to Adventure”.\u00a0 However, I feel it necessary to give you my perspective on the main title “Countdown to Final Crisis”\u00a0first.\u00a0 So please bear with me…<\/p>\n
Countdown to Final Crisis<\/strong> The primary “Countdown to Final Crisis”\u00a0has been disappointing.\u00a0 Coming on the tails of the fantastic weekly comic 52<\/a>, this one is a let down.\u00a0 Also, considering the amount of money it takes to collect a year-long weekly series, I would hope for more return on my investment.\u00a0 You can read my\u00a0thoughts on the first half of “Countdown to\u00a0Final Crisis” over on THE UNIQUE GEEK listserv<\/a>, which I posted back in October.\u00a0 There has certainly been a few\u00a0shining moments in this comic, but taken as a whole it hasn’t been worth the financial drain and time spent.\u00a0 If you have some burning desire to throw away money, you can order from your local comic book shop the “Countdown to Final Crisis” trade paperbacks that\u00a0cover issues #51-26 – \u00a0volume 1<\/a> & volume 2<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n The “Search for Ray Palmer” specials were also fairly disappointing.\u00a0 Basically they were just trying to capitalize on the popularity of some of their previously-published Elseworlds<\/a> comics.\u00a0 It really didn’t add much to those old storylines, and in some ways sullied them.\u00a0 Other than the Jokester and the Victorian-era Blue Beetle, I really can’t remember anything redeeming about\u00a0these specials.\u00a0 Just my opinion.\u00a0 In hindsight, I’ve read all of these and I’m still not sure why finding Ray Palmer was important.\u00a0 If you are a glutton for punishment, you can order the “Search for Ray Palmer” trade paperback<\/a> from your local comic book shop.<\/p>\n “Countdown Arena<\/a>” was actually better than I expected.\u00a0 This was the comic I was dreading the most, so I guess my expectations were already low.\u00a0 It was basically “Fight Club” for the Multiverse set.\u00a0 There were some neat moments: the tantric Superman, the Blue Beetle fight, the Nightshade fight, the Captain Atom brigade, and stuff like that.\u00a0 In the end, I’m glad I read this one.\u00a0 Also, Scott McDaniel’s<\/a> art is really good (but then again, he almost always is great).\u00a0 You can order the\u00a0“Countdown Arena” trade paperback<\/a> from your local comic shop.<\/p>\n It’s worth mentioning at this point that I did not read (and have no plans to read) “Countdown Presents: Lord Havok and the Extremists”<\/a>.\u00a0 No matter how big of a Justice League Europe<\/a> fan I am, I’m still not going to read this crap.\u00a0 Lastly, I have been buying the “Countdown to Mystery<\/a>” mini-series, but I haven’t had a chance to read it yet.\u00a0 Hopefully it will be worth it.<\/p>\n Countdown to Adventure<\/strong>\u00a0 Now each issue of this\u00a0comic cost\u00a0$3.99.\u00a0 On the surface, that seems expensive.\u00a0 However, if you break that up by page cost, that’s a pretty good deal for 38 pages at 10 cents a page, whereas the typical\u00a022 page comic for $2.99 is 13 cents a page.\u00a0 Truthfully, the trade paperback is the best deal at 9 cents a page, but I wasn’t going to wait for the trade.<\/p>\n Lead Story<\/strong> First question you may be asking yourself, do I have to read “Countdown to Final Crisis” to understand the lead story in “Countdown to Adventure”?\u00a0 The answer is absolutely not.\u00a0 This lead story with Adam Strange, Animal Man, and Starfire has nothing to do with “Countdown to Final Crisis”.\u00a0 It’s also not necessary for you to read “52”, however, you might get a little more out of the story if you did.\u00a0 With that said, the “Countdown to Adventure” story was a good follow up to 52.\u00a0 In 52 the characters were trapped together, without their families on alien worlds.\u00a0\u00a0The story in Countdown to Adventure really focused on these characters families and hometowns, so it was a nice counterpoint to 52.\u00a0 Even though Starfire doesn’t have a family or hometown (as her planet was destroyed), they still dealt with this for her character by linking her with Animal Man’s family.\u00a0<\/p>\n I’ve read some of Adam Beechen’s<\/a> work before, some of which I enjoyed, some of which I didn’t.\u00a0 This was definitely one I did.\u00a0 He did a great job establishing Adam Strange and Animal Man’s regular lives.\u00a0 Then showed how they were disrupted by the events of this story.\u00a0 While\u00a0the families of the main stars were great supporting characters, there was also an interesting\u00a0antagonist introduced named Steven “Champ” Hazard.\u00a0 The story blasted back and forth between Earth and Rann, and had a good cosmic adventure feel.\u00a0The art in this story was also very good;\u00a0very contemporary and exciting.\u00a0<\/p>\n Overall, the lead story was a great read and I’d recommend it.<\/p>\n Back-up story<\/strong> Costumes<\/strong> Adam Strange got a total revamp in 2004 and they updated his costume to look totally bad ass (again, see image further up the page).\u00a0 Midway through Countdown to Adventure, they reverted him to his old costume (see right).\u00a0 And the promotional art for Rann\/Thanagar Holy War looks like he’s still in the old costume.\u00a0 That really bums me out.\u00a0 He looks like a dork.\u00a0 They need to bring back the cool 2004 armor.<\/p>\n Okay, enough rambling.\u00a0 Go out and read “Countdown to Adventure” already!\u00a0Go pick up the issues now, or be lazy and wait until July for the trade paperback<\/a>.<\/p>\n As always, thanks for reading!<\/p>\n
\nI recently put myself through “Countdown” hell.\u00a0 It was an excruciating process, but\u00a0one I felt necessary in order to\u00a0get caught\u00a0up in my comic book reading.\u00a0 I’ve been buying DC’s “Countdown to\u00a0Final Crisis<\/a>” since it started.\u00a0 It’s\u00a0a weekly comic being published for one year, which is supposed to ultimately lead to DC’s next big crossover “Final Crisis<\/a>“.\u00a0 I stayed on top of “Countdown” on a weekly basis\u00a0for a while, but consistently felt disappointed by it.\u00a0 I’m obviously not alone, as it’s become\u00a0one of the most maligned comics in recent history.\u00a0 Eventually, I just gave up reading it (but continued to buy it), promising myself I would sit down and read them all prior to “Final Crisis”.\u00a0 Well, here we sit just a few weeks away from “Final Crisis”.\u00a0 I decided it’s\u00a0time to get caught up on “Countdown”.
\nOver the course of a week, I read 36 “Countdown”-related comics:<\/p>\n\n
\n![\"Adam](\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/adamstrange.jpg\")
<\/a>This brings us to “Countdown to Adventure”. This was an eight-issue mini-series focusing on what DC calls their “spacefaring heroes”.\u00a0 Those heroes include: Adam Strange<\/a>, Starfire<\/a>, Animal Man<\/a>, and Forerunner<\/a>.\u00a0 Each issue\u00a0featured a 21-page lead story written by Adam Beechen<\/a> featuring Adam Strange, Animal Man, and Starfire; with a 17-page back-up story written by Justin Gray featuring Forerunner.\u00a0 Personally, I would have preferred more pages for Adam Strange and Animal Man (less for Forerunner), but I still enjoyed the comic.<\/p>\n
\n![\"Animal](\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/animalman.jpg\")
<\/a>One of the most appealing factors of this series to me\u00a0is the oddball characters thrown together.\u00a0 The three lead characters are completely different and have no logical connection.\u00a0 However, ever since “52<\/a>” these characters have worked together really well.\u00a0 Adam Strange<\/a> is your\u00a0classic Flash Gordon-like action hero.\u00a0 As a huge JLA fan, I’ve been negligent about giving two shits about Adam Strange. I always found him incredibly boring; I just didn’t “get it”.\u00a0 However, once I read the Adam Strange Planet Heist mini-series<\/a> in 2004 where they revamped him, it clicked.\u00a0 He’s a really cool character!\u00a0 That mini-series is available in trade paperback<\/a> also.\u00a0 Starfire<\/a> is the naive yet incredibly sexy alien princess.\u00a0 I’ve never\u00a0been a huge fan of hers, but then most writers don’t handle her very well.\u00a0 Animal Man<\/a> is the somewhat regular guy, married with kids, getting caught up in these nutso adventures.\u00a0\u00a0His secret identity is Buddy Baker, and most people end up calling him Buddy, rather than Animal Man.\u00a0 I’m not sure what\u00a0writer thought Animal Man (a guy whose powers are based\u00a0on Earth animals) was the perfect character for space adventures, but I’m glad they were thinking outside of the box. It’s been fun to have him along.\u00a0 He’s been one\u00a0of my favorite DC characters for over 15 years.\u00a0 I would highly recommend the old Grant Morrison<\/a> Animal Man series to anyone (trade paperbacks volume 1<\/a>, volume 2<\/a>, and volume 3<\/a>).<\/p>\n![\"Starfire\"](\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/starfire.jpg\")
<\/a>When they came up with the concept for this comic, they were trying to harken back to the anthology science fiction comics of the Silver Age.\u00a0 To some degree they succeeded.\u00a0 This was a fun space romp with lots of action and character development.\u00a0 As always, I really enjoyed the Animal Man and Adam Strange parts.\u00a0 I was surprised that I enjoyed the Starfire parts, as I usually don’t like her as a character.\u00a0 These characters were first thrown together after “Infinite Crisis<\/a>” in the pages of “52<\/a>“.\u00a0 They spent a year\u00a0together lost in space trying to find a way home.\u00a0 Their adventures in 52 were interesting and the characters meshed\u00a0surprisingly well.\u00a0\u00a0Due to their popularity, DC crafted this Countdown to Adventure mini-series to bring them back together.\u00a0 Obviously this mini-series sold well, because they are bringing the gang back together again for the Rann\/Thanagar Holy War<\/a> eight-issue mini-series starting in May.\u00a0 Even though I love these characters together, it’s a very delicate balance to make their stories work together.\u00a0 Therefore, I’m fearful we are one bad story away from wrecking the reader’s enjoyment of this group.\u00a0 The new mini-series obviously picks up the threads of the previous Rann\/Thanagar War<\/a> mini-series, which honestly wasn’t that enjoyable.\u00a0 It was cool to see all the space characters together, but the story itself was weak.\u00a0 I hope this new mini-series is strong because I like these spacefaring heroes together.\u00a0 If the next mini-series is terrible, we might not get to see another story featuring these spacefaring heroes together again.<\/p>\n
\n![\"Forerunner\"](\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/forerunner.jpg\")
<\/a>The Forerunner<\/a> character first appeared in “Countdown to\u00a0Final Crisis” and was pretty unimpressive as a character.\u00a0 Then in “Countdown to Adventure” her blah-ness continued.\u00a0 But somewhere along issue #5, her back-up story began to become interesting.\u00a0 She became surrounded by interesting characters, had a defined purpose, and began some interesting adventures.\u00a0 While not as good as the lead story, by the end of the series I found myself liking the Forerunner character and looking forward to further adventures.\u00a0 This story does tie into “Countdown to\u00a0Final Crisis”, so you might benefit from reading that.\u00a0 However, I don’t think it’s absolutely necessary.\u00a0 I’d also like to compliment Justin Gray for his storytelling in this book.\u00a0 Each installment was only 17 pages yet each installment was action-packed, told a lot of story, and kept moving forward.\u00a0 In an era where it typically takes six 22-page issues just to tell a simple story, I was impressed with the pace of this one.\u00a0 Good job, Justin!<\/p>\n
\n![\"Adam](\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/adamstrange_old.jpg\")
Being a complete comic dork, I did want to comment on Animal Man and Adam Strange’s costumes.\u00a0 In regard to Animal Man, Countdown to Adventure featured an older style Animal Man costume; one that featured a simple giant “A” across his chest.\u00a0 I personally prefer the 1990’s version with the stylized “A” that looks like a heart beat monitor (see the image further up this page).\u00a0 I know I’m a dork, but if you are still reading this far into this blog entry, you probably are too.\u00a0 \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\nTell the world about ONCE UPON A GEEK:<\/h3>